This invention relates to an optical connector for use in connecting an optical fiber.
In recent years, an optical connector is requested to be reduced in size, i.e., to be reduced in overall length. Furthermore, since an available work space for assembling the optical connector is limited in an axial direction of the optical connector, a simple assembling structure is requested.
As an existing optical connector, there is known a cylindrical optical connector comprising a plug and a receptacle. The plug comprises a ferrule for holding an optical fiber, an insulating front housing accommodating a ferrule, an insulating rear housing opposite to the front housing in an axial direction, a spring interposed between the rear housing and the ferrule, and an outer shell to be engaged with the receptacle (for example, see Japanese Patent (JP-B) No. 3062930).
In the above-mentioned optical connector, the spring must be accommodated in the front and the rear housings together with the ferrule. However, accommodation of the ferrule and the spring can not be completed only by the front and the rear housings and an assembling structure is inevitably complicated. Further, assembling of the optical connector requires complicated operations. Specifically, it is necessary to insert the front housing into the shell, to accommodate the ferrule in the front housing, and to fit a bottom plate to the shell while pushing the rear housing forward against a reaction force of the spring.
Another optical connector is disclosed in Japanese Patent (JP-B) No. 3483889 (WO95/035520). The optical connector comprises a ferrule, an attachment body for receiving the ferrule, a tubular crimp ring connected to an axial one end of the attachment body, a tubular cable boot fitted over the crimp ring, and a plug body fitted to an axial other end of the attachment body.
However, in each of the above-mentioned optical connectors, the number of components is large so that a dimensional error of an overall length of the optical connector is inevitably increased. This results in a disadvantage that the optical connector is not stable in performance.